Who Will Stand Up for the Christians?
By Ronald S. Lauder, President of the World Jewish
Congress
* * *
* * *
Why is the world silent while Christians are being
slaughtered in the Middle East and Africa?
(*DEAFENING SILENCE*)
In Europe and in the United States, we have witnessed
demonstrations over the tragic deaths of Palestinians who have been used as
human shields by Hamas, the terrorist organization that controls Gaza. The
United Nations has held inquiries and focuses its anger on Israel for defending
itself against that same terrorist organization. But the barbarous slaughter of
thousands upon thousands of Christians is met with relative indifference.
* THE SHEEPLE REQUIRE LEADERSHIP; THERE IS NO LEADERSHIP.
The Middle East and parts of central Africa are losing
entire Christian communities that have lived in peace for centuries. The
terrorist group Boko Haram has kidnapped and killed hundreds of Christians this
year — ravaging the predominantly Christian town of Gwoza, in Borno State in
northeastern Nigeria, two weeks ago. Half a million Christian Arabs have been
driven out of Syria during the three-plus years of civil war there. Christians
have been persecuted and killed in countries from Lebanon to Sudan.
Historians may look back at this period and wonder if
people had lost their bearings. Few reporters have traveled to Iraq to bear
witness to the Nazi-like wave of terror that is rolling across that country.
The United Nations has been mostly mum. World leaders seem to be consumed with
other matters in this strange summer of 2014. There are no flotillas traveling
to Syria or Iraq. And the beautiful celebrities and aging rock stars — why
doesn’t the slaughter of Christians seem to activate their social antennas?
President Obama should be commended for ordering
airstrikes to save tens of thousands of Yazidis, who follow an ancient religion
and have been stranded on a mountain in northern Iraq, besieged by Sunni Muslim
militants. But sadly, airstrikes alone are not enough to stop this grotesque
wave of terrorism.
* SEND IN THE FRENCH FOREIGN LEGION!
The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is not a loose
coalition of jihadist groups, but a real military force that has managed to
take over much of Iraq with a successful business model that rivals its
coldblooded spearhead of death. It uses money from banks and gold shops it has
captured, along with control of oil resources and old-fashioned extortion, to
finance its killing machine, making it perhaps the wealthiest Islamist
terrorist group in the world. But where it truly excels is in its carnage,
rivaling the death orgies of the Middle Ages. It has ruthlessly targeted
Shiites, Kurds and Christians.
“They actually beheaded children and put their heads on a
stick” a Chaldean-American businessman named Mark Arabo told CNN, describing a
scene in a Mosul park. “More children are getting beheaded, mothers are getting
raped and killed, and fathers are being hung.”
This week, 200,000 Aramaeans fled their ancestral
homeland around Nineveh, having already escaped Mosul.
The general indifference to ISIS, with its mass
executions of Christians and its deadly preoccupation with Israel, isn’t just
wrong; it’s obscene.
* WHAT DOES THE AUTHOR SUGGEST?
In a speech before thousands of Christians in Budapest in
June, I made a solemn promise that just as I will not be silent in the face of
the growing threat of anti-Semitism in Europe and in the Middle East, I will
not be indifferent to Christian suffering. Historically, it has almost always
been the other way around: Jews have all too often been the persecuted minority.
But Israel has been among the first countries to aid Christians in South Sudan.
Christians can openly practice their religion in Israel, unlike in much of the
Middle East.
This bond between Jews and Christians makes complete
sense. We share much more than most religions. We read the same Bible, and
share a moral and ethical core. Now, sadly, we share a kind of suffering:
Christians are dying because of their beliefs, because they are defenseless and
because the world is indifferent to their suffering.
Good people must join together and stop this revolting
wave of violence.
* HOW...???
It’s not as if we are powerless. I write this as a
citizen of the strongest military power on earth.
(*SNORT*)
* AND WHAT HAS ALL OUR "POWER" DONE FOR US...?
HMM...?
I write this as a Jewish leader who cares about my
Christian brothers and sisters.
(*CLAP...CLAP...CLAP*)
The Jewish people understand all too well what can happen
when the world is silent. This campaign of death must be stopped.
* LET ISRAEL SAVE THE CHRISTIANS THEN! FOR SURELY
CHRISTIANITY SEEMINGLY HAS NO INTENTION OF STANDING UP FOR ITS PRACTITIONERS.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
8 comments:
http://www.cnsnews.com/commentary/terence-p-jeffrey/354-percent-109631000-welfare
* CALL IT ONE HUNDRED AND TEN MILLION... ROUGHLY ONE-THIRD OF THE POPULATION...
(*GNASHING MY TEETH*)
109,631,000 Americans lived in households that received benefits from one or more federally funded "means-tested programs" — also known as welfare — as of the fourth quarter of 2012, according to data released Tuesday by the Census Bureau.
The Census Bureau has not yet reported how many were on welfare in 2013 or the first two quarters of 2014.
But the 109,631,000 living in households taking federal welfare benefits as of the end of 2012, according to the Census Bureau, equaled 35.4% of all 309,467,000 people living in the United States at that time.
When those receiving benefits from non-means-tested federal programs — such as Social Security, Medicare, unemployment and veterans benefits — were added to those taking welfare benefits, it turned out that 153,323,000 people were getting federal benefits of some type at the end of 2012.
Subtract the 3,297,000 who were receiving veterans' benefits from the total, and that leaves 150,026,000 people receiving non-veterans' benefits.
The 153,323,000 total benefit-takers at the end of 2012, said the Census Bureau, equaled 49.5% of the population.
The 150,026,000 taking benefits other than veterans' benefits equaled about 48.5 percent of the population.
When America re-elected President Barack Obama in 2012, we had not quite reached the point where more than half the country was taking benefits from the federal government.
It is a reasonable bet, however, that with the implementation of ObamaCare — with its provisions expanding Medicaid and providing health-insurance subsidies to people earning up to 400% of poverty — that if we have not already surpassed that point (not counting those getting veterans benefits) we soon will.
How do you put in perspective the 109,631,000 people taking welfare, or the 150,026,000 getting some type of federal benefit other than veterans' benefits? Well, the CIA World Factbook says there are 142,470,272 people in Russia. So, the 150,026,000 people getting non-veterans federal benefits in the United States at the end of 2012 outnumbered all the people in Russia.
In 2012, according to the Census Bureau, there were 103,087,000 full-time year-round workers in the United States (including 16,606,000 full-time year-round government workers). Thus, the welfare-takers outnumbered full-time year-round workers by 6,544,000.
California, the nation's most-populated state, contained an estimated 38,332,521 people in 2013, says the Census Bureau. Texas had 26,448,193 people, New York had 19,651,127, and Florida had 19,552,860. But the combined 103,984,701 people in these four massive states still fell about 5,646,299 short of the 109,631,000 people on welfare.
In the fourth quarter of 2008, when President Obama was elected, there were 96,197,000 people living in households taking benefits from one or more federal welfare programs. After four years, by the fourth quarter of 2012, that had grown by 13,434,000. Those 13,434,000 additional people on welfare outnumbered the 12,882,135 people the Census Bureau estimated lived in Obama's home state of Illinois in 2013.
* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)
http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/08/19/4297006/us-wont-reveal-records-on-health.html
After promising not to withhold government information over "speculative or abstract fears," the Obama administration has concluded it will not publicly disclose federal records that could shed light on the security of the government's health care website because doing so could "potentially" allow hackers to break in.
(*SNORT*)
* THAT'S RIGHT UP THERE WITH "WE MUST DESTROY THE VILLAGE IN ORDER TO SAVE IT!"
Obama instructed federal agencies in 2009 to not keep information confidential "merely because public officials might be embarrassed by disclosure, because errors and failures might be revealed, or because of speculative or abstract fears."
* AND YET...
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services denied a request by The Associated Press under the Freedom of Information Act for documents about the kinds of security software and computer systems behind the federally funded HealthCare.gov. The AP requested the records late last year amid concerns that Republicans raised about the security of the website, which had technical glitches that prevented millions of people from signing up for insurance under President Barack Obama's health care law.
* FOLKS... WE KNOW IT'S A DISASTER. WE KNOW THIS!
In denying access to the documents, including what's known as a site security plan, Medicare told the AP that disclosing them could violate health-privacy laws because it might give hackers enough information to break into the service.
* IT'S THE GOVERNMENT WHICH IS BREAKING THE LAW - AGAIN.
The government's decision highlights problems as it grapples with a 2011 Supreme Court decision that significantly narrowed a provision under open records law that protected an agency's internal practices. Federal agencies have tried to use other, more creative routes to keep information censored.
* MEANING AN END ROUND AROUND THE 2011 SUPREME COURT DECISION. MEANING... BREAKING THE LAW... AGAIN.
* TO BE CONTINUED...
* CONCLUDING... (Part 2 of 2)
Even when the government concludes that records can't be fully released, Attorney General Eric Holder has directed agencies to consider whether parts of the files can be revealed with sensitive passages censored. CMS told the AP it will not release any parts of any of the records.
* GOOD COP, BAD COP; IT'S ALL A GAME... A FARCE... A PLAY WHERE EACH GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL PLAYS HIS OR HER PART ACCORDING TO THE PREDETERMINED SCRIPT.
In addition to citing potential health-privacy violations, the government cited exemptions intended to protect personal privacy and law-enforcement records, although the agency did not explain what files about the health care website had been compiled for law-enforcement purposes.
(*SMIRK*)
Some open-government advocates were skeptical. "Here you have an example of an agency resorting to a far-fetched privacy claim in an unprecedented attempt to bridge this legal gap and, in the process, making it even worse by going overboard in withholding such records in their entireties," said Dan Metcalfe, a former director of the Justice Department's office of information and privacy who's now at American University's law school.
Keeping details about lockdown practices confidential is generally derided by information technology experts as "security through obscurity." Disclosing some types of information could help hackers formulate break-in strategies, but other facts, such as numbers of break-ins or descriptions of how systems store personal data, are commonly shared in the private sector. "Security practices aren't private information," said David Kennedy, an industry consultant who testified before Congress last year about HealthCare.gov's security.
Last year, the AP found that CMS Administrator Marilyn Tavenner took the unusual step of signing the operational security certificate for HealthCare.gov herself, even as her agency's security professionals balked.
* ONE MORE TIME...
Last year, the AP found that CMS Administrator Marilyn Tavenner took the unusual step of signing the operational security certificate for HealthCare.gov herself, even as her agency's security professionals balked.
(*PURSED LIPS*)
http://www.nationalreview.com/campaign-spot/385832/after-isis-beheading-video-uks-cameron-cancels-vacation-obama-returns-his
Over there:
“U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron cut short his summer vacation to return to London and chair urgent meetings on the threat posed by ISIS in Iraq and Syria, calling the video ‘shocking and depraved.’”
Over here:
President Obama went back to his vacation on Martha’s Vineyard Tuesday evening following less than 48 hours in Washington, leaving people puzzled over why he came back in the first place.
Obama’s two days in Washington were mostly quiet, and concluded with the president receiving his daily national security briefing in the morning, and joining Vice President Biden to huddle with members of his economic team in the afternoon.
Administration officials have insisted for weeks that the president just wanted to return to the White House for a series of meetings, but the explanation was met with a healthy dose of skepticism, since Obama rarely interrupts his vacations.
Lead item on Whitehouse.gov right now: HUD Secretary Julian Castro is sworn in.
No statement yet from the president on the not-quite-confirmed-but-not-disputed Foley murder video.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/aug/19/race-based-hate-crimes-spike-in-dc/
Race-based hate crimes jumped in Washington, D.C., last year even as most other types of bias crimes decreased, with analysts saying such incidents could be vastly underreported among minority groups uncomfortable coming forward to authorities.
* "COULD BE?" MEANING... "BUT MAYBE NOT," RIGHT? DEFINITELY MEANING, "NO EVIDENCE OF VAST UNDERREPORTING," CORRECT?
(*SMIRK*)
* FOLKS... AGAIN... THE LEAD:
Race-based hate crimes jumped in Washington, D.C., last year...
D.C. police say that of the 18 race-based hate crimes in 2013, the majority of victims were white and the majority of suspects black.
* BIG SURPRISE...? NOT TO ME! GEEZUS...
The number of incidents was up from the 13 race-based bias crimes reported in 2012.
Census data in 2013 put the District’s black population at just under 50%, with whites making up 35% of the population and Hispanics another 10%.
Of the 18 victims of race-motivated hate crimes last year, 10 were white, four were black, two Hispanic, one Asian and one of another race, according to D.C. police.
* HMM... I'D SURE AS HELL LIKE TO SEE THOSE NUMBERS FURTHER BROKEN DOWN...
“In the case of the District, there are very few hate crimes reported against Latinos and Asian-Americans,” he said. “But it would be wrong to conclude that there are none occurring.”
* BUT WHEN ALL IS SAID AND DONE...
D.C. police say that of the 18 race-based hate crimes in 2013, the majority of victims were white and the majority of suspects black.
“Unless the person is expressing ‘This is because you’re gay, you’re black, you’re white, you’re Latino,’ it’s really, really hard to capture if it’s a hate crime,” Delroy Burton, chairman of the D.C. police department’s branch of the Fraternal Order of Police said. “What I’m hearing from my guys suggests that there are more hate crimes out there, but the suspects are not saying anything.”
* FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH... I DON'T BELIEVE IN CATEGORIZING "HATE CRIMES" AS CRIMES DESERVING EXTRA PUNISHMENT. WE STILL HAVE FREE THOUGHT IN THIS COUNTRY... (AT LEAST I DEMAND IT FOR MYSELF). LET PEOPLE HATE WHOM THEY HATE. IT'S THE CRIME THAT MERITS PUNISHMENT!
In its 2013 annual report, which detailed the hate crime data, the police department did not provide any analysis of incidents that targeted victims by race.
(*SMIRK*)
Mr. Burton said he was not entirely surprised by the fact that 13 of the 18 racially motivated hate crime suspects were black.
(*GUFFAW*)
* A BIT OF AN UNDERSTATEMENT THERE, I'D WAGER!
“Regardless of what the category of crime is, the vast majority of the people committing those crimes will be black. It’s just a demographic issue,” Mr. Burton said.
* YEP. AND MOST CRIME WILL BE BLACK ON BLACK. AGAIN... A DEMOGRAPHIC ISSUE.
Under D.C. law, if a person is found guilty of a hate crime, the court may fine the offender up to 1 times the maximum fine and imprison him or her for up to 1 times the maximum term authorized for the underlying crime.
* THIS IS SICK. AND IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN RULED UNCONSTITUTIONAL YEARS AGO!
* THREE-PARTER... (Part 1 of 3)
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/385792/less-welfare-more-charity-michael-tanner
In 1985, wealthy New York businessman George McDonald was moved by the plight of the city’s homeless population; he was particularly struck by the story of a woman who had frozen to death on the streets after being ejected from Grand Central Station. Initially, he responded by providing the homeless with free meals, but he soon found that his generosity was doing nothing to help beneficiaries to improve their situation. The same people continued to show up for food month after month. His willingness to help might have kept people from going hungry, but it did nothing to help them rise out of poverty.
Therefore, he rethought his approach and created the Ready, Willing, and Able program (officially the Doe Fund), which eschewed handouts in favor of “paid work and personal responsibility.”
Today, McDonald’s program assists some 700 people at any one time, with four centers in New York City and one in Philadelphia.
The program focuses on the homeless and on newly released convicts, providing food and shelter, but only in exchange for work. Participants must work at least 30 hours per week for one of the program’s profit-generating businesses, ranging from street cleaning to pest control to culinary arts. Workers are initially paid slightly more than the minimum wage and are eligible for raises, but they are required to pay child support, if applicable, and to save a portion of their wages. After nine to twelve months, the program helps participants transition to outside employment and housing.
A Harvard University study found that the recidivism rate for ex-convicts in the program was 60% lower than for a control group with the same characteristics after one year.
McDonald’s efforts are particularly successful, but far from unique. In every city around this country, private charities, some faith-based, some secular, are successfully helping the poor and disadvantaged. And they are doing so, by and large, without government involvement.
* TO BE CONTINUED...
* CONTINUING... (Part 2 of 3)
This is not a new phenomenon. For example, during the first part of the 20th century, when African Americans were generally excluded from government social-welfare programs, black lodges, such as the Prince Hall Masons, and other institutions established a wide-ranging, and highly successful, charitable network. They built orphanages and old-age homes, provided food to the hungry and shelter to the homeless, and helped the unemployed find work. Black lodges also provided medical care, hiring physicians to provide services to members and their families. Known as “lodge-practice medicine,” the networks were so extensive that African Americans were more likely to have some form of health insurance than were whites during the early years of the 20th century.
Unfortunately, such private charitable networks were simultaneously squeezed by racism on the one side and the growing welfare state on the other. Today, they have largely faded away.
Advocates of the modern welfare state continually tell us that if we didn’t have TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families), food stamps, housing vouchers, and a host of other redistributive programs, there would be no one to care for the poor or those in need. The reality is that Americans are an amazingly generous people, and more than willing to step up and help those who cannot help themselves.
* TO BE CONTINUED...
* CONCLUDING... (Part 3 of 3)
Since the War on Poverty began in 1965, private charitable giving has totaled more than $10.2 trillion (in 2014 dollars); roughly 29%, or $3 trillion, of this went to human services or public-society benefits. And this doesn’t count the hundreds of billions of hours that Americans spend volunteering to help others. Last year alone, 64.5 million Americans gave 7.9 billion hours of their time and effort in volunteer work.
Charitable giving amounts to far less, of course, than the $19 trillion that federal, state, and local governments have spent fighting poverty since 1965. But the evidence suggests that charitable giving would have been much higher in the absence of the welfare state. There are studies, some dating as far back as the 1870s, showing that private giving increases as government programs decrease, and conversely decreases as government programs grow more generous, leaving the overall amount of money spent (both public and private) relatively constant.
* INTERESTING...
More important, private charity is more likely to be effective in giving poor people the tools they need to get out of poverty.
Recent studies suggest that the War on Poverty did help to reduce the worst deprivations of material poverty, especially in its early years. However, the welfare state it spawned has long since reached a point of diminishing returns. In recent years, we have spent more and more money on more and more programs, while realizing few, if any, additional gains.
More important, the War on Poverty has failed to make the poor independent or increase economic mobility among the poor and their children. We may have reduced the discomfort of poverty, but we have failed to truly lift people out of poverty.
Private charitable efforts, on the other hand, can address the real underlying problems that leave people in poverty. They are able to demand accountability and responsibility. They provide “a hand up, not a hand out.” And, as Ready, Willing, and Able demonstrates, they are able to stress the primacy of work as a route out of poverty.
The failures of the War on Poverty should serve as an object lesson for policy-makers today. If poverty and inequality persist, it is not because we have failed to redistribute enough wealth. Rather, it is because the welfare system fails to provide either the tools or the incentives to help poor people become self-sufficient.
Perhaps what we need is a little less welfare and a bit more charity.
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